Contributions towards a Flora of Ceylon. 491 



Glossanthus zeylanica, R. Br. in Hors. PL Jav. Rar. 

 p. 121. 



Klugia zeylanica, Alph. DC. Prodr. 9. p. 276. 



Hab. — Common in moist shady places about Kandy. Fl. 

 during the rains. 



Descr. — Annual, erect, 1-1^ feet high, pilose-pubescent, pubes- 

 cence forked or stellate. Stem round, fleshy, branched. Leaves 

 alternate, petiolate, ovate-oblong, cordate and very unequal at the 

 base, acute or shortly acuminated, entire, dark green above, pale 

 beneath, pennivenous, veins about 12 on the large side, 4-5 inches 

 long, and about 2£ broad: Petioles 12-15 lines long. Racemes 

 opposite the leaves, floriferous at the apex. Flowers secund, from 

 20-25, deep blue. Pedicels about 3 lines long, each with a subulate 

 bract about half its length at its base. Calyx free, persistent, tubu- 

 lar, 5 angled, angles all equally winged, glabrous except the margins 

 of the wings which are pilose : Limb deeply 5 -cleft, the lobes 

 lanceolate, acuminate, with a glandular tip, glabrous. Corolla hypo- 

 gynous, gamo-petalous : Tube cylindrical, about 6 lines long, with 

 the throat closed, white : Limb bilabiate, upper lip broadly ovate, 

 truncate, about 1£ lines long, reflexed, white, lower lip large, entire, 

 orbicular, about 4 lines long, deep blue, with a yellow ring round a 

 broad concavity which exists at the base. Stamens 4, with the ru- 

 diment of a fifth, didynamous : filaments filiform, glabrous, reaching 

 to the base of the upper lip of the corolla : anthers 2-celled, glabrous, 

 cohering in a mass. Hypogynous gland cyathiform, crenate, yellow. 

 Ovary free, ovate, glabrous, 1 -celled, with 2 parietal placentae, the 

 divergent laminae of which bear the ovules. Style filiform, glabrous, 

 persistent. Stigma orbicular, concave. Capsule enclosed within 

 the calyx, 1 -celled, 2-valved, with a loculicidal dehiscence, the 

 valves bearing the placentae along their middle. Seeds numerous, 

 elliptical, pendulous ; testa brown, reticulated. 



Obser. I. — This is one of the most easily characterised 



of the Indian species of the genus, the rounded incurved 



base of the large side of the leaf, the forked or stellate 



pubescence, the equally winged angles of the calyx, and 



3 s 



